The Baby The Billionaire Demands

Lola might hate Rodrigo now, but she loved their son. That was clear in everything she’d done, even taking the million-dollar check that must have hurt her pride. But she’d done it, because she’d feared Rodrigo might try to take the baby from her.

She’d chosen custody of their son over the vast fortune Rodrigo could have offered her.

She’d made a mistake, taking the child from him. But he’d also made a mistake, believing the very worst of her.

For Jett’s sake, he would try to forgive. They would start fresh. He would accept his responsibility to his son. Lola would do the same.

Or would she?

“Marry you?” She breathed, her eyes wide. “You’re crazy.”

“Our son deserves a stable home. Surely you can see that.”

Lola’s forehead furrowed. “He has one! With me!”

He said stiffly, “I’m willing to forgive you for stealing him from me—”

“I didn’t steal him! I was protecting him!”

“But you have to realize that everything has changed now.”

Her beautiful face looked numb. “It doesn’t mean we have to marry. I know how you feel about marriage.” She took a deep breath. “After all your fiancées cheated on you...”

Rodrigo stiffened, wondering how she’d heard. He certainly hadn’t spoken about it over the years. But some people did know. His exes. Marnie. And gossip had a way of spreading, especially in his industry.

“This is different,” he said coldly. “We’re not in love.”

She didn’t look encouraged by this statement. Shaking her head, she lifted her chin stubbornly. “We can set up some kind of visitation schedule.”

“Are you serious?” He raised his eyebrows. “Shuttling our baby from place to place, coast to coast? Always separated from one parent? Never really sure of where his home is? No.”

“It doesn’t have to be like that. Lots of healthy, happy children have parents who aren’t married—”

“Not my son.”

She glared at him. “Why marriage?”

Rodrigo couldn’t explain to her what his childhood had been like. He’d never fully told anyone, not even the three women he’d claimed to love during his brief engagements long ago. He said shortly, “Is it so strange? I want us both to be there for our son. Every day. And for him to feel safe and loved.”

“And you think he doesn’t feel loved now?” she said indignantly.

“I know you love him, Lola. I can see it in everything you’ve done.” She relaxed slightly, until he added, “Which is the reason you’ll marry me.”

She scowled. “I’m not marrying someone I don’t love.”

Rodrigo drew closer, looking down at her in the small apartment. “You used to love me. Once.”

“I learned my lesson, didn’t I?”

“Fine. You don’t need to love me.” His lips curled. “In fact, I’d prefer it if you don’t. It keeps things simpler. But you will marry me, Lola. Soon.” Straightening the cuffs of his tuxedo jacket, he said, “Sleep on it. Once you’ve calmed down, you’ll see I’m right.”

“I won’t!”

Rodrigo looked down at her in the soft glow of the lamplight. His voice was low. “This is a dangerous world. Much can happen. Accidents. Illness. People can die.”

“Are you threatening me?” She gasped.

“What? No!” Jolted, he clawed his hand roughly through his dark hair. “I’m saying a child needs as much protection, as much security and love, as he can get. My parents died, Lola. One, then the other. What happened to yours?”

The blood drained from her face. She’d always refused to speak of her past, but now he knew his suspicions were right.

“You’re an orphan,” he guessed. Biting her lip, she looked away. “So our child already has a mark against him, with no grandparents to love him.” He set his jaw. “I’m an only child. So no uncles or aunts.”

Looking away, she muttered, “I have two sisters.”

His eyebrows raised in surprise. “You do?”

Lola stared at the floor. “I haven’t seen them for a long time.”

Rodrigo sensed some pain there, but he didn’t want to ask. He just pressed his advantage. “So already, our baby is more vulnerable, with no extended family. Don’t you want him to have a father? Think of what I can give him. What I can give both of you.”

She stiffened. “I don’t need more money—”

“Not just money. My name. My time. My protection. My love.”

She froze. “Your love.”

“Yes. A father’s love.” He set his jaw. “Jett needs me as much as he needs you, Lola. I want to be there for him, to help raise him, to teach him how to be a man. Together, you and I can give him a better childhood than we had. Either of us.”

He saw by her expression that his shot hit home. She suddenly looked uncertain, her eyes luminous in the shadowy light.

Turning away, Rodrigo stopped at the door.

“My son will have my name, Lola. And so will you. This marriage will happen. Accept it.” He gave her a hard smile. “Sleep well tonight. Because tomorrow, you’re both coming home with me.”

* * *

Rodrigo arrived the next day, as promised, bright and early. But his men came much sooner than that.

Lola peeked out the window again. Eight stories below, she still saw the black SUV parked across the street. It had arrived last night, thirty minutes after Rodrigo had left.

For all his fine words about marriage and family and love, she thought bitterly, he didn’t trust her. He’d sent his henchmen to watch her apartment building to make sure she didn’t try to flee with the baby.

They weren’t even married yet, but he was already treating her like a prisoner.

But could she totally blame him? a small voice said inside her. She’d left California and kept their baby a secret for a year.

Shut up, she told that voice angrily.

But she’d finally come to the reluctant conclusion that Rodrigo was right. Their baby needed two parents, his whole family. Lola’s own father had died when she was five, and she’d always felt that loss, somewhere in the back of her mind. In some ways, losing her father was the start of losing everything, because that was when her mom had had to go back to work. She’d earned only a fraction of what her father had, so they’d had to move out of their sunny three-bedroom house and into the trailer.

Now, Lola looked back at her small furnished apartment. She’d packed their meager possessions into three suitcases, leaving the dishware and odds and ends for the next tenant. She and Jett had been happy here, she thought wistfully.

Then she shook her head with a snort, remembering all the nights she’d cried herself to sleep over the last year. It was why she hadn’t invited Hallie to stay here, when her friend had briefly needed a place to stay last summer. Lola couldn’t bear to let anyone see her cry. Well, except Jett, but only because he’d cried even more.

Lola was supposed to be the strong one, the one her friends came to for advice and support, not the one who needed help. She’d pushed Hallie and Tess to get the financial support their babies deserved. She’d pushed them to get their lives together. And look at those two now—happy, in love, joyful. She’d helped them get there. Speaking the brutal truth with love, Lola called it, though her friends sometimes grumbled that her words could be more brutal than loving.

But they didn’t know how scared Lola felt on the inside. She’d worked through her pregnancy because she was afraid to spend the money Rodrigo had thrown at her. Afraid that bad things could happen. And even after a year, she hadn’t been brave enough to contact her baby sisters. Guilt still hung heavily over her at how she’d failed them at eighteen.

A child needs as much protection, as much security and love, as he can get. My parents died, Lola. One, then the other. What happened to yours?

She looked at Jett, now stretched out happily on a soft blanket over the rug. Rodrigo was right. As much as she hated to admit it. Jett deserved as much security and love as she could possibly give.

Because parents could die. They could get sick or go to jail. And even if Lola was ever brave enough to contact her sisters, they were still so young, Kelsey fifteen, Johanna only twelve. Whether they now hated her, or they’d forgotten her completely, the truth was, her sisters had a new family now. They’d been lost to her long ago.

Jett was all that mattered. She wanted him to be safe and loved. And from the moment Rodrigo had seen their baby, he’d seemed to feel the same.

Already our baby is more vulnerable, with no extended family. Don’t you want him to have a father? Think of what I can give him... My name. My time. My protection. My love.

She’d barely slept that night, tossing and turning. Sometime around 3:00 a.m., she’d come to a decision.

She didn’t love Rodrigo, and he didn’t love her. But she would marry him. Their baby deserved that sacrifice.

Yet it wasn’t easy. With a sinking heart, Lola looked back out the window and saw another car had arrived. She recognized, even at this distance, the gorgeous, arrogant man getting out of it. She swallowed hard. Then her jaw set.

Fine, they would marry. But it would be on her terms.

She heard the intercom buzz, and his husky voice demanding entrance. She pressed the button to let him in downstairs. Putting on her coat, Lola picked up her baby. Tucking his blanket into her diaper bag, she waited with a sense of dread.

A few minutes later, she heard heavy steps in the hallway. A hard knock sounded at her door. With a deep breath, she opened it.

Rodrigo’s dark eyes burned through her. “You are ready?”

So much was encompassed in that simple question.

“Yes,” she said.

“Good.” Relaxing slightly, he strode into the apartment, looking so handsome she almost couldn’t bear it. He wore a long, open black cashmere coat that revealed the shape of his broad shoulders and biceps, with a well-cut black shirt and trousers beneath. He was followed inside by his driver and bodyguard, both of whom she knew slightly from the old days.

“Have a long night, did you, boys?” she said to them dryly. As they gathered the suitcases, they glanced at each other. Rodrigo’s smile widened.

“You knew they were watching?”

“Of course I knew,” she snapped at him. “You’re not very trusting.”

“I’m glad you didn’t try to run.”

She pressed her lips together. “There was no point. You convinced me that you’re right.”

“I’m always right.” But even as he spoke the arrogant words, his dark eyes looked her over appreciatively. As befitted the cold November weather, she wore a form-fitting black puffy coat, with a faux-fur-edged hood, and a hem that stretched down over her hips. Her legs were covered with black leggings and her black boots matched her hood, edged with faux fur.

Against her will, she blushed beneath his glance. It enraged her. Why did he still have that effect on her? It didn’t seem fair!

“Is this all, Miss Price?” asked the bodyguard.

“And the stroller by the door.”

As his two henchmen left the apartment with the suitcases and stroller, Rodrigo held out his arm. “Come.”

“Wait.”

At the breathless sound of her voice, Rodrigo looked down at her questioningly.

“Like I said. I realized you’re right. Jett needs a stable home, and a father to raise him. We should marry. Even though we don’t love each other.” Her voice trembled a little. “It’s best for Jett.” She paused. “But—”

“But?” His voice was low and dangerous.

She lifted her gaze. “I just want to make sure we understand each other. This marriage is for duty. For convenience.”

“Convenience?” he repeated.

How could he not know what she meant?

“In...in name only,” she whispered, her teeth suddenly chattering.

He gave a low, hard laugh, his dark eyes glittering in the morning light. “Is that what you think?”

“I mean it, Rodrigo—”

“No.” He cupped her cheek. “You don’t.”

His eyes burned through her, and he slowly lowered his head toward hers.

She sucked in her breath as, against her will, a fire of desire swept through her body that she was helpless to deny. Her toes curled in anticipation, and she closed her eyes, holding her breath, waiting for him to kiss her.

At the last moment before his lips would have touched hers, he stopped. Confused, she opened her eyes.

His face was cruel as he looked down at her with a cold, mocking smile. “In name only, querida?”

Her cheeks suddenly burned. “You arrogant bastard—”

“Come. We have a busy day planned.”

His eyes softened as they rested on the dark-haired baby against her hip. He caressed the baby tenderly on the head. “We will be a family soon, pequeño.” Then he gave Lola a smile that didn’t meet his eyes. “No more talk of convenient marriages. You will be conveniently in my bed. And soon.”

“In your dreams,” she retorted. For answer, he gave her a sensual smile.

“Yes. I have dreamed of it, Lola,” he said huskily. “And soon those dreams will be reality.”

Her eyes widened at his admission, and her mouth snapped shut as she recalled all the hot nights when she, too, had dreamed of him. Fuming, she followed him out of the apartment.

When they reached the street, she saw one of his men placing the suitcases in the back of the black SUV, as the other put the stroller in the back of Rodrigo’s sleek luxury sedan.

Lola frowned. “Where are we going?”

Rodrigo opened the sedan door. “A few places.”

Seeing a brand-new baby seat latched securely into the sedan’s back seat, she wondered if his longtime executive assistant, Marnie, had arranged it. She’d always hated that smug busybody, now more than ever. “Where?”

“You’ll see.”

As the SUV turned south, Rodrigo drove Lola and the baby north, to a cutting-edge private clinic on the Upper East Side. As far as she could tell, it had opened up on Sunday, bringing in a full staff, just for their paternity test. Within two hours, they had the results. Jett was Rodrigo’s son.

“I knew it,” Rodrigo said quietly when he got the results.

Lola looked at him irritably. “Then why did you insist on a test?”

“There’s knowing, and there’s knowing.”

“That makes no sense. You could have just trusted me.”

“I needed proof.” He didn’t explain further. When it came to asking for help or showing weakness, Rodrigo was even worse than Lola.

After the clinic, the next stop that morning turned out to be the prestigious white-shoe Manhattan law firm of Crosby, Flores and Jackson, where, amid the hushed elegance of a private office, Lola was presented with a fifty-page legal contract of a prenuptial agreement.

Sitting at the gleaming mahogany desk, she read through it slowly, to the obvious surprise of the lawyers, marking up any clause she didn’t like with a red pen.

Lola had made below average grades in school, but she’d always been good at debate. It was why, when she was twelve, her mother had handed Lola the phone if she needed to convince the electric company to turn the lights back on, or deal with a debt collector. It was also how, after Lola’s failed attempt at a “quick and easy” movie star career, she’d eventually become executive assistant to a powerful tycoon. Lola knew how to absorb and how to deflect. She knew when to pay attention and how.

In short, she knew how to argue.

Even opaque legal language couldn’t confuse her. It was like following a shell game. You just never took your eyes off the ball.

Finally, she set down the papers.

“I have some changes,” she said coolly.

“Do you?” Rodrigo’s voice was amused.

“Yes. Starting with this clause in paragraph Four C...”

In the end, Lola got what she wanted. She negotiated away one financial item after another—the amount of money set aside for alimony, child support, housing and staff levels in case of a divorce—in order to keep the one thing she actually cared about, which was primary custody of Jett. That was the one thing she was never, ever willing to lose.

She marveled that Rodrigo seemed focused on something else entirely: making sure Lola would be punished if she were ever unfaithful during their marriage.

She was amazed he’d be worried about that. As she’d told him, she’d never kissed another man in her whole life. But as she’d heard from a gossipy production assistant, he’d had three fiancées cheat on him. So maybe she could understand, after all.

Whatever the reason, Lola gladly used it to her advantage. The prenuptial agreement was altered. In case of divorce, no matter which of them was at fault, Lola would get custody of Jett. But if she ever cheated on Rodrigo, even after thirty years of marriage, she wouldn’t get a penny. No alimony. No marital property. Nothing but the three suitcases she’d arrived with.

But since she obviously wouldn’t cheat, she’d won. She smiled as they left the law office.

“You never thought of becoming a lawyer?” Rodrigo murmured, his dark eyes gleaming as they pushed the baby’s stroller out of the wood-paneled private office.

“Lawyer?” Lola snorted. “Me?”

“You think like one.”

She shook her head. “I’m not even sure if I passed my GED test.”

They left the law office and got back into the car. As Rodrigo drove her and the baby south toward his SoHo loft, he suddenly asked, “Why did you drop out of high school?”

She looked at him guardedly. “What do you mean?”

“You’re smart, Lola. A fighter.” He shook his head wryly. “Something I’ve sometimes learned the hard way. Why didn’t you go to college? Why did you drop out of high school and go to LA and do—” he hesitated “—what you did?”

Her cheeks suddenly burned. “I had my reasons.”

She couldn’t explain why, at eighteen, she’d been so desperate to earn money, so stupid and naive, that she’d done things she wasn’t proud of. Things that had caused Rodrigo to call her ugly names, six years later. She hadn’t done everything Marnie had accused her of—not even close—but what she’d done was bad enough. And she’d still failed to save her sisters.

But she wasn’t going to explain and let Rodrigo think she was a weakling and a failure, in addition to being a—well, he’d never actually called her a whore. But that was how he’d made her feel.

Wrapping her arms around herself, she looked stonily out the window. Silence fell in the luxury sedan as he drove south through Manhattan, the only sound the yawns of their baby in his car seat behind them.

“You’ve always been quick,” he said, his hands tightening on the steering wheel. “If you’d stayed in school—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You could have gone far. You could be a big-time lawyer or CEO of a major corporation by now. Why didn’t anyone convince you to even try?”

She didn’t look at him. A lump lifted to her throat.

She had been good in school once. When she was seven, she’d loved to puzzle over math and read. But after her father’s death, her mother had been too busy and exhausted to help with school. Later, she’d remarried. After Lola’s two half-siblings were born—and especially after her new stepfather was injured on the job—school had become a luxury. It just wasn’t important anymore, not like making sure there was food in the fridge, and caring for her sisters when her stepfather was passed out drunk, and their mother working the overnight shift.

When Lola was fifteen, her mother had died. Bonnie had been feeling bad for months, but put off seeing the doctor, insisting she didn’t have money or time. By the time she’d finally gotten her diagnosis, the cancer was terminal. She’d lived only a few months after that. Her stepfather, trying to cope with the grief and his family’s sudden lack of income, ended up going to prison for dealing drugs. There had been nothing left to hold their family together.

Staring hard out the window of the luxury sedan, Lola wiped her eyes fiercely. She hadn’t even told Hallie and Tess that. Just as she’d never told them anything about her baby’s father, not even Rodrigo Cabrera’s name.

It was the only way Lola knew how to deal with that kind of radioactive pain. To pretend it didn’t exist.

“I didn’t care, all right?” she said numbly, staring hard out the window. “I never cared about college.”

“What do you care about, then?”

Lola thought of her family. Everyone she’d lost. Everyone she’d loved but been unable to save.

Setting her jaw, she whispered, “Protecting what’s mine.”

CHAPTER THREE

THE EARLY NOVEMBER morning was cold and gray as Rodrigo turned the car down Prince Street, turning on Mercer.

Lola rolled down the window, breathing the cool air, relishing the feel against her hot skin. The air made her shiver. Or maybe it was the thought that she’d soon be Rodrigo’s wife. She looked up at the lowering sky. She wondered what Hallie and Tess would say when they were invited to Lola’s wedding out of the blue.

Her lips quirked. They would be surprised, to say the least.

She’d met Hallie Hatfield and Tess Foster last year at a New York single moms’ support group. They’d been the only ones who were pregnant, and they’d soon realized that none of them had told the fathers about the babies.

Her friends were both now happily married. While Lola just prayed she wasn’t making a horrible mistake.

Rodrigo pulled his sedan to the front of a fashionable prewar building in SoHo, where a doorman took his keys.

“Good morning, Mr. Cabrera. In the garage like always?”

“Thank you, Andrews,” Rodrigo said, walking around the car to get the stroller from the trunk. The doorman’s eyes widened when he saw it, and even more when he saw Lola get out and take their baby in her arms.

Tucking sleepy Jett into the stroller, Lola followed Rodrigo into the lobby of the luxurious building, and into an elevator that he accessed with a fingerprint.

On the top floor, the elevator opened directly onto a private foyer. And Lola entered the penthouse loft she hadn’t visited in over a year.

Shivering, she looked around the large, bohemian penthouse loft. Colorful furniture filled the enormous space, and huge windows showed an expansive, unrestricted southern view of the city, to the skyscrapers of Lower Manhattan. She could dimly see the steel and glass building where she’d once worked for Sergei Morozov. Strange to think that Rodrigo could have been unknowingly looking at her, whenever he’d visited New York. So close, but so far apart.

The bare brick walls were decorated with old original movie posters, along with old neon signs, which were no doubt originals, too. Rodrigo had occasionally seen neon signs he liked as he traveled to his movie sets around the world, from Tokyo to Sydney to Berlin. She’d watched in awe as he’d casually bought entire businesses, simply to acquire the signs.

That was Rodrigo, Lola thought, a little bitterly. He’d rip out someone’s beating heart just to tap his toe to the rhythm.

She blinked hard, to make sure no trace of emotion was on her face. She might become his wife, but he’d never possess her. She’d never let herself love him, ever again.

“Miss Price!” The New York housekeeper, Mrs. Farrow, came in from the next room of the loft. The woman’s plump face broke into a big smile. “I’m so glad you’re back. And how exciting, you’re going to be married?”

“Strange, huh?” Lola said, feeling awkward. Especially when the woman was followed by a white-haired, distinguished-looking man Lola didn’t know.

“Not strange. Lovely.” Mrs. Farrow knelt before the stroller, smiling at Jett. “And this is your baby?”

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